Quick ez he’d git thoo readin’ a book, of co’se wife she’d be for dustin’ it off and puttin’ up on the top closet shelf where a book nach’ally belongs; but seem like Sonny he wants to keep ’em in sight. So wife she’s worked a little lace shelf-cover to lay under ’em, an’ we’ve hung our framed marriage-c’tificate above ’em, an’ the corner looks right purty, come to see it fixed up.
Sir? Oh, no; we ain’t took him from none o’ the other schools yet. He’s been goin’ to Miss Phœbe’s reg’lar now—all but the exhibition an’ picnic days in the other schools—for nearly five months, not countin’ off-an’-on days he went to her befo’ he settled down to it stiddy.
He says he’s a-goin’ there reg’lar from this time on, an’ I b’lieve he will; but wife an’ me we talked it over, an’ we decided we’d let things stand, an’ keep his name down on all the books till sech a time ez he come to long division with Miss Kellog.
An’ ef he stays thoo that, we’ll feel free to notify the other schools thet he’s quit.
HER FIRST HORSE SHOW
By DAVID GRAY
She folded the program carefully for preservation in her memory-book, and devoured the scene with her eyes. It was hard to believe, but unquestionably Angelica Stanton, in the flesh, was in Madison Square Garden at the horse show. The great arena was crowded; the band was playing, and a four-in-hand was swinging around the tan-bark ring.
What had been her dream since she put away her dolls and the flea-bitten pony was realized. The pony had been succeeded by Lady Washington, and with Lady Washington opened the epoch when she began to hunt with the grown-up people and to reflect upon the outside world. From what she had gathered from the men in the hunting-field, the outside world seemed to center in the great horse show, and most of what was interesting and delightful in life took place there.
Besides the obvious profit of witnessing this institution, there had arisen, later on, more serious considerations which led Angelica to take an interest in it. Since the disappearance of Lady Washington and the failure to trace her, Angelica’s hope was in the show.
One of the judges who had visited Jim had unwittingly laid the bases of this hope. “All the best performers in America are exhibited there,” he had said in the course of an interminable discussion upon the great subject. And was not Lady Washington probably the best? Clearly, therefore, soon or late Lady Washington would be found winning blue ribbons at Madison Square Garden.